September 21, 2006

A Play A Day #161

The Moral

Cast:DadToddlerMom

Setting: A living room with sofa and armchair and end table.

(Dad enters, struggling against himself, making exaggerated gasping, gagging and funny noises, he trips over the back of the sofa, flips off the sofa seat and flips hard onto his back on the floor, tries getting up but slips on some unseen object or fluid, slams chest and face directly to the floor, slowly pulls himself up using the armchair, he stands mostly, but puts way too much weight on one of the arms of the chair and crashes back down to the floor with the chair. He stands, picks up the chair, looks around in confusion for where to put it, in so doing, trips over the end table, slamming down onto his back with the armchair landing on top of him, he staggers to his feet, whips blood from his nose and face, puts the armchair back safely, then wiping his brow in an exaggerated manner, flops down on the sofa, he jolts back to his feet, screaming in great pain trying to reach with both hands behind his back, turns his back to the audience as he struggles and we see a large knife stuck into the center of his back, blood quickly rushing out. He struggles some more to reach the knife, spinning about wildly to do so, he eventually gets weak and dizzy from the blood loss, the spinning and the screaming, and falls hard on his back. He lets out a horrible scream. We hear laughter offstage, toddler laughter and a grown woman's laugh, Mom enters holding Toddler, both laughing.)

Toddler: Again!

(Dad slowly gets up, walks to Mom and turns around, Mom unceremoniously pulls the knife out of Dad's back, Dad lets out another wrenching howl of pain, Mom adlibbing joyous sounds and exhortations with the toddler, Dad repositions the knife in the sofa cushion, Mom and Toddler exit, Dad exits, lights down, lights back up, Dad stumbles back on stage and repeats the entire performance.)

(Note to directors: Repeat this whole sequence as often as you want; just as long as you think it might take until you have successfully taught your audience the moral of the play - Toddlers Are Dicks.)